Trickle, Trickle, Little Star

I've started writing a political column for The Wave (www.rockawave.com) in addition to my bi-weekly "School Scope" column focusing on education.

I'm calling the column "Politically Unstable" (naturally). Here is the column I submitted for this week and will run if space is available or if people need extra newsprint to wrap fish.

Trickle, Trickle, Little Star
by Norman Scott

After seeing the Rockaway Theater Company’s performance of “The Music Man,” I spent a good part of the summer humming the Harold Hill classic, “Ya Got Trouble.”

Well, either you're closing your eyes
To a situation you do now wish to acknowledge
Or you are not aware of the caliber of disaster indicated
By the presence of govment in your community.
Ya got trouble, my friend, right here,
I say, trouble right here in the old US of A.
Why sure I'm a Wall Street player,
I'm always mighty proud to say it.
I consider that the hours I spend
With a sub prime mortgage in my hand are golden.
I say
You’ve got govment
With a capital "G,"
And that rhymes with "P" and that stands for POOR!
Trouble, trouble, trouble, trouble, trouble...
We're in terrible, terrible trouble.



So let’s get this straight. John McCain proudly proclaims at the Republican convention the problem with this country is too much regulation. A month later when the financial meltdown occurs, he says we have to impose regulations to prevent this from happening in the future. Stuart Mirsky, The Wave’s conservative columnist wrote, “The conservative inclination for deregulation is blamed by angry populists without any recollection of who actually put the kibosh on regulating the two agencies at the core of this meltdown.”

Okay, I get it. The Democrats are just as much to blame. But if the “conservative inclination for deregulation, ” seemingly adopted by the Democrats in the Clinton years, got us into this mess, how are they justifying more deregulation? Or are they giving up the conservative anti-government mother ship?

You can’t blame me if I get confused. The mantra has been “big government is the problem.” Or any government. But they are for strong defense budgets. Guess what? BIG GOVERNMENT!!!

Big government gave us social security and regulation of the meat we eat. And the drugs we take. And the toys our kids play with. Under the Bush years, there were enormous cuts in inspectors in all the regulatory agencies as they were politicized. How are all those unregulated products from China working out? Ptomaine city.

Big government gave us the US highway system. If not for that we would still be driving on dirt roads when we sojourn down to Florida.

Big government responded to Sputnik in 1957 by ramping up federal funds to schools to create more mathematicians, scientists and engineers that help made the US space program work.

And big government through DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) was the instrumental force in creating the first iteration of the Internet.

Barack Obama wants to use government in the same way to spur the creation of new energy sources that will allow us to drive a nice quiet car without having to load our trunks with money to buy gas. And heat our homes without having some big oily, smelly truck block traffic on our streets while it spills oil all over our lawns.

I know, I know. Conservatives believe in trickle down. Sure, I see all those corporate executives who get millions by raising the value of the stock just itching to pour money into stuff that might be good for us.